If you are building a website or redesigning your old one, you should consider building a database driven website. Most people think that only “large” websites should be database driven, but even the smallest website could benefit. Database driven sites give you easy access to your website’s content which can reduce support and maintenance costs. They also allow for a much richer, interactive user experience.
Posts Tagged ‘website design’
New Study Reveals Your Website Is Key To B2B Sales
Thursday, November 3rd, 2011A recent study conducted by Demandbase and Focus proves that a company’s website is a critically important source of new sales leads. The only lead source more effective is referrals and personal connections. The study also found that even when the sales lead originated from another source, nearly all leads end up reviewing the website at some point during the purchasing process.
The REAL Secret For Online Marketing Success
Monday, July 11th, 2011
Most likely you’ve read a lot of blog posts and articles with titles similar to this one. Chances are they were not-very-well veiled attempts at selling an e-book, a white paper, or trying to get you to join a “mastermind” group. You won’t find any of those things here. We’ll tell you the truth about online marketing success…and it won’t cost you a dime!
But first you need to hear the hard truth. Here’s what the online marketing “gurus” won’t tell you…
- There’s no magic ‘set-it-and-forget-it’ program for PPC.
- There’s no social network that will get people in your door.
- There’s no SEO guru who can wave a wand and ‘out-smart’ Google.
- There’s no way to generate leads and obtain sales simply by having a beautiful website.
- There’s no quick fix.
The problem with online marketing gurus and some one-off service providers is that you can’t focus all of your efforts on one aspect of your online marketing and expect results.
You must have the right balance of great website design, search engine optimization, search engine marketing and social media marketing for true online marketing success.
It would be great if we could give you a formula right here and tell you how much of your time and how much of your marketing budget you should devote to each element, but that isn’t possible. Finding the formula that will work for you requires an in-depth analysis of your company, your clients, your community, and your products or services.
But what we can tell you is that online marketing success requires the right combination of the foundation elements and requires that you develop a strategy. That strategy should then become a plan that is followed consistently and the results should be reviewed regularly to identify when or if the plan needs to be adjusted.
So, if you are serious about becoming successful online, you should work with a company that can provide all of the foundation elements. Work with a company that knows…
- how to build a website that will convert website visitors into leads and sales;
- how to write and implement your online marketing program to increase rankings with search engines;
- how to manage a PPC program so that it makes maximum use of your budget;
- how to participate socially so that you become a part of your prospective customer’s community.
No man is an island and no one online marketing element is a successful online marketing program. If you would like to learn more about how the pieces fit together, we invite you to sign up for our seminar “Creating A Powerful Online Presence: Foundational Elements For Online Success” to learn more.
And guess what? It’s free!
There’s A Blog And There’s A Website…And Now There’s A Blogsite!
Wednesday, June 29th, 2011
LocalDirective is working on a project that we are really excited about. We aren’t quite ready to announce it yet, but we wanted to go ahead and introduce a new concept – the blogsite.
Definition: Blogsite
The term “blog” is a short version of “weblog” which is an ongoing, frequently updated chronicle of information and links. Blogs were meant to allow for quick and easy publication of information. This is different than the traditional website. Updating a website requires technical skills which meant that the process to publish information was slower. However, the power and abilities of a website allowed for robust, interactive delivery of information. A blogsite is a combination of the blog and website where the delivery of information was fast and easy while still maintaining the power of a website.
Our Mission
We were approached by a company that wanted to create a community of like-minded people that facilitated the sharing of information. Since this was meant to be a community, they needed to be able to easily update and share information and allow for other members of the community to share as well. They also wanted to be able to deliver functionality that, due to its complexity, was traditionally delivered through a website. All of this community involvement was a key part of this company’s marketing program so in the end, this project was meant to increase brand recognition and consumer loyalty.
LocalDirective Takes The Challenge
The LocalDirective team carefully reviewed this goal and developed a list of requirements. Then it came time to determine what functionality would be used to build this community. What resulted is the birth of the blogsite.
Do You Need A Blogsite?
With today’s emphasis on businesses incorporating social media into marketing you should, if you aren’t already, be developing your social media strategy. At the heart of social media marketing is the concept of community. You can develop community using traditional social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and others. Or, you could choose to build your own channel as was the case of this company. It is too early to determine whether the community will show the results that are projected, but early indications are that it will exceed expectations!
Hits and Visits Are Nice – But Conversion Is What Matters!
Thursday, May 26th, 2011
If you have a website, then you should be checking your web analytics. Web analytics is the collection, measurement and analysis of data for the purposes of understanding how a website is performing.
When people first start reviewing their web analytics they typically focus on number of visits and hits. While looking at these numbers will give you an idea of how well you are directing traffic to your site, focusing on the number of hits and visits is not a good way to measure your website’s effectiveness.
If you are like most business owners, you developed your website with the hope that it would generate sales or leads. People who simply go to your website and quickly leave do not result in sales or leads. These people got to your website and either didn’t like what they saw, didn’t know how to take action, or weren’t interested in your product or service. You can see then the hits and visits are nice, but…
Website Effectiveness = Conversion to Sales or Leads
Our philosophy is that we begin each new website development or website redesign with the end in mind. Everything starts with the end goal in mind. End goals can take many forms:
- Generating a call to your office
- Selling you product online
- Eliciting a donation for your organization
- Signing up for your training program
- Adding someone to your newsletter list
Once the goal is firmly established, we are then able to design a website and write content in a way that produces the results you are seeking. Then you will be able to focus on the numbers that really matter.
If your website is attracting visits and hits but not resulting in sales, you should work with a website company that knows how build a website that converts. Because that is a clear signal that it is time to change something – and fast!
Top 5 Mistakes Businesses Make With Their Website
Thursday, April 14th, 2011Here at LocalDirective we’ve done thousands of website redesign projects for businesses. We refer to them as website revitalization because we take out-of-date, brochure-type websites and turn them into sales and lead generation machines.
The first step in our website redesign process is reviewing the business’s old website. As a result, we’ve seen lots of poorly designed websites. There seems to be certain missteps that businesses make over and over so we thought it would be helpful for you if we shed light on them to help you recognize if you are making one (or all!) of them.
Here are 5 of the top mistakes that businesses make with their websites:
- No Clear Call-to-Action
A call-to-action is a request to the visitor to perform some act on any given page of your website, and these calls-to-action are usually related to the major conversion focus of your site. A call-to-action may be to make a purchase or to generate a lead (in which case you would ask them to fill out a form to get on your e-newsletter list or download a white paper). A good call-to-action is supported by a clearly communicated problem and good description of how your products or services will benefit the visitor or solve that particular problem.
Having a call to action is an essential element of any website. Not only will it result in an increase in purchases or in gaining new sales prospects, but it also is a great way to measure the success of your website.
- Poor Navigation
Most businesses fail to give navigation the proper amount of time and consideration that this very basic, but critical, part of their website deserves. Navigation can be the difference between a website that converts and one that doesn’t. If a person is not able to navigate your website easily and in an organized manner they are likely to get frustrated and leave.
Think of navigation as the table of contents of your website. It should flow in a logical manner and take users through the education and purchasing experience in a step-by-step process, with each level of depth providing a richer level of content detail.
A good navigation process should be developed with the goal of keeping visitors on the site as long as necessary to get to the conversion action. You’ll want them to stick around long enough to gather the information they need to ultimately make the purchase, fill out your registration form, download your white paper, or whatever call-to-action you are requesting.
- Inconsistent Design
You’ve probably heard the statistics indicating that you have about 5 seconds to grab the reader’s attention before they leave your site. It is really more complicated than that. You actually have about 5 seconds for people to learn enough about the purpose of your website and whether they want to stay around long enough to figure how to find what they are seeking. If they stick around, they will click a link to take them to another page on your site. If the design of the next page is very different than the first page, you will make them figure out the process all over again.
One of two things could happen if you have inconsistent design. One is that you will force them to waste valuable time that could have been spent consuming content used instead to figure out how your site design works. Two, and worse, is that your site could annoy them enough that they leave.
Be sure that you are consistent in terms of navigation, colors, text formatting, and layout. Don’t make your prospects “re-read the map” every time they go to a new page on your site. Let them instead focus on consuming all of your wonderful content that moves them along the call-to-action path.
- Unorganized Content
It turns out that ‘content is (still) king’ in the online world. Both visitors and search engines reward content-laden sites. The problem is that website visitors consume information much differently than do readers in the offline word. Instead of a linear approach, movement on a website is much more organic and multi-directional…and thus unpredictable.
The good news is that you can still help guide people through levels of content by recognizing using cueing devices and by organizing in a way that meets their needs. For instance, you will want to use headlines and sub-headlines effectively. This provides a way for your readers to easily scan your website to find the information they are looking for because the sooner they find this information the better your website will convert.
The bottom line is that while you will need to provide original, timely and relevant content, make sure you spend time organizing and presenting in the proper way for the online world. You will see your measures of visitor engagement skyrocket and you will be rewarded with more conversions.
- Inappropriately Complicated Registration Forms
These days registration forms are on almost every site. Registration forms allow businesses to gather information about prospects who may be interested in their products or services. People typically do not like to fill out forms, but they are willing to do so in exchange for valuable information. Too many businesses make the mistake of asking for too much information.
Only ask for the information you need to take the action they are requesting. For example, if you are asking them to sign-up for your e-newsletter, you might consider just asking for their email address. If you are offering to get in touch with them to provide information by phone or by mail then obviously you will need their phone or physical mailing address.
You’d hate to have gone through all of the effort to get people to take action, only to lose them at the end. Solve this by asking only for the information you need, and no more.
These 5 mistakes are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to issues we typically address during our website revitalization process, but since they are so common and have such an impact on your success or failure, we offer them to you as ways to improve the conversion rate of your website.
Website Design – Form and Function
Thursday, March 24th, 2011Form follows function – that has been misunderstood. Form and function should be one, joined in spiritual union. Frank Lloyd Wright, 1908
Frank Lloyd Wright, a renowned American architect, couldn’t have possibly known back in the early twentieth century when he spoke those words that we’d still be following this mantra in the early twenty-first century and applying it to web design.
But, what was true then is still true today. A website needs to be very functional and look good. This is more difficult than you would think. If you’ve spent any time surfing the web you have most certainly seen websites that have great looking flash intros and graphics but you were unable to find the information you were looking for. But then again, studies have been done that track web reader’s eye movement and they prove our eyes are attracted to images so you cannot ignore the fact that design matters.
So what is the answer?
A good combination of design and functionality can have a remarkable impact on the success of your website. Therefore, it is important to avoid the temptation to ‘over-design’ and focus on the goal of your website. In other words, you need to keep the “end in mind” and then develop your website to accomplish those objectives. Once you are clear about the objectives you should make sure to include the following components:
- Pleasing design – Be sure to work with a web designer that is familiar with the best practices related to web eye-tracking studies. Eye-tracking studies reveal what users are truly interested in by tracing the movement of their eyes. Knowing this will tell the designer how to structure the site and incorporate design to best take advantage of the limited amount of time that users spend on your site.
- Intuitive Navigation – It is critical that you provide the website visitor direction and guide them where you want them to go. There is a way to create navigation that is more likely to take the reader step-by-step through your site. By guiding them through your website they are more likely to take the action you identified at the beginning of your website development/redesign process.
- Compelling content – Your website content must provide good information to the reader. Web readers have notoriously short attention spans. Therefore, your content must be very relevant and of the highest quality. In addition, you must remember that your content must not only work for human readers, but the search engines as well. Your content must be keyword rich so that the people who need the information that you provide can find it.
- Call to action – Every website should have an objective that it wants the reader to complete. It can be anything from signing up for your newsletter to purchasing your product. The call-to-action must be clearly articulated and easy to do. Ideally, your call-to-action is measurable because then you can determine the effectiveness of your website.
Finding that ideal combination of form and function takes time, but by concentrating on the primary purpose of your website you might just find that your perfect balance reveals itself!
Go Mobile in 2011!
Thursday, January 20th, 2011As you sit down to map out 2011 goals for your business, consider this: The adoption rates of smart phones and other 3-G technologies are some of the highest ever seen.
This growth means many customers and prospective customers can no longer be counted on to view your website from a desktop or laptop browser; instead they may be viewing your website on their mobile devices. Since it is probable your browser-based website does not render correctly on these mobile devices, working with companies like LocalDirective can help you get an affordable mobile presence and a marketing plan to harness this incredible opportunity.
The mobile web is continuing its explosive growth of more than 2000% in the last 2 years. And these high end mobile devices, such as iPhones, Androids, Palm and Blackberry, are an ideal platform for advertisers since consumers carry their network-enabled smart phones at nearly all times.
Currently, there are approximately 5 billion active mobile devices globally as compared to 1.7 billion active PCs. Morgan Stanley analysts believe, based on the current rate of adoption, the mobile web will be bigger than desktop Internet use by 2015.
Even more interesting, the demographics of these users is very appealing. The average mobile media user is 32 years old, 53% male, and 47% female. And smart phone users are wealthy, with 51% making more than $75k and 34% making more than $100k.
Basics to Mobile Websites
Given the growth trend and adoption rates of the mobile web, you cannot be left out of this important marketing channel. While there are plenty of ways to pull your current website and format it to display on a mobile device, this is not a great practice if you want to convert your audience.
Rather, the better practice is to design a completely new site, geared specifically for mobile users and trends. With much smaller screens, the amount of content on your traditional site will be overwhelming to a mobile user. Part of effectively developing a mobile website is honing your message to the bare essentials while leaving enough to convert your audience. It’s like a low-carb diet where you essential message is the protein, and the other content is the carb. You don’t cut it out completely, but you do reduce it significantly.
Mobile Marketing (SEM/SEO)
Just like with traditional websites, the “If you build it they will come” philosophy has proven over and over to be ineffective to generating sufficient traffic to make a website effective. Rather, effectively using Search Engine Marketing and Search Engine Optimization campaigns helps the right people find your site and purchase your product. While you can try to do this on your own, most people find it’s more cost effective to use a profession Internet Marketing Firm, like LocalDirective, to manage these campaigns.
Moving Small Energy Businesses Forward
Wednesday, November 17th, 2010The Energy Industry has been dominated by large corporations for the last 5 decades. However, due to continued legislative development, smaller energy companies are emerging and providing consumers with alternatives to what has “always been”.
One of the primary obstacles facing these companies is developing a brand that can compete with those who’ve been around for years. While this is possible with an unlimited budget, these start-up companies have limited resources to develop the brand recognition needed.
Leveraging the Three-Legged Stool
When it comes effectively developing a brand and creating a buzz about a new alternative for consumers, the “Three-Legged Stool” approach is a great strategy for building a business:
- Website – Without an effective website, any Internet Marketing campaign is destined for failure. This means having a website that is not only functional, but is designed in a way that draws a visitor in, aiding in the conversion of site traffic to new clients.
- Search Engine Marketing – A simple fact of start-up businesses is they will not generate traffic without spending some money putting their brand in front of consumers. This means being able to effectively focus on the target population and reduce the cost per lead generated. The paid feature of marketing is both tradition PPC ads as well as contextual and banner ads across sites where your target market frequent.
- Search Engine Optimization – SEO is simply the process of gaining “organic”, or unpaid visibility in Search Engines. While competing against larger companies who have been around for what seems like forever, it is oftentimes not difficult to achieve better ranking. These companies rely solely on their known brand to carry them forward, with very little emphasis on proactive marketing. Couple tradition SEO strategy with a comprehensive Social Media strategy to educate your target audience, and you’ll be set to outperform most large organizations.
Want to learn more about the Three-Legged Stool and how you too can develop a powerful online presence? Check out the free webinars we offer most Tuesdays and Thursday.
